That’s why, just in time for the holidays, we’re delivering some great gifts for our Android users, with enhancements to Hub+, the BlackBerry Keyboard, and the BlackBerry Launcher. In addition to fine-tuning our software to improve performance and eliminate bugs, we’ve added a bunch of features we’re sure you’ll love.

Here’s an overview of what’s under the tree with December’s Android software updates for your PRIV, DTEK50, or DTEK60.

BlackBerry Hub+ Apps

Accounts Improvements: It’s easier than ever to stay organized! You can now choose to hide specific accounts from Hub and Contacts and stop them from synchronizing. You can also set a default email account in the Hub for sending.

A Better Hub at a Glance: Create a custom view for emails that can be personalized to multiple, specific contacts and show contact avatars in Hub email notifications.

Tap the icon on the left side of the search bar, then select “My apps & games” from the menu that pops up.

Either tap “Update All” or select which apps to update on an individual basis.

Tap “Download” and the update will begin, even if you don’t see a progress bar or another indicator.

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/12/blackberrys-spreading-some-holiday-cheer-with-our-latest-android-software-updates/feed/0holidaycheer_squaremichaelcl1BlackBerry Android Updateholidayselfie_squareOctober’s BlackBerry Android Software Update: More Treats for Smartphone Usershttp://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/10/octobers-blackberry-android-software-update-more-treats-for-smartphone-users/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/10/octobers-blackberry-android-software-update-more-treats-for-smartphone-users/#respondThu, 20 Oct 2016 14:30:24 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=35729/ Read More]]>We’ve been hard at work on the next updates for BlackBerry’s Android apps, including Hub+, Camera, and Keyboard. Just in time for Halloween, we’re releasing improvements that will be a real treat for Android users. To take you back to your trick-or-treating days, these aren’t little Hershey’s Kisses-style updates, but rather a full-size Hershey’s bar treat in your candy bag.

Hub+ is a software subscription service for most Android Marshmallow (6.x) or Lollipop (5.x) devices from any manufacturer. (That’s around 54% of the one billion or so Android users, if you’re counting.) It includes BlackBerry Hub, Calendar, Password Keeper, Contacts, Device Search, Notes, Tasks, and Launcher and has received thousands of rave reviews (average 4.2 out of 5).

Our focus on putting the “smart in the smartphone” means that users of BlackBerry’s secure Android smartphones such as PRIV and DTEK50 as well as non-BlackBerry Android users BOTH benefit from our innovations. And innovation doesn’t mean “develop, release, and quit.” Hub+ was released in August, received its first update in September, and now, in October, we’ve added more new features, based on your feedback, to make the Hub+ experience even better for you.

Our October Android software release also includes updates for the Camera and Keyboard software on BlackBerry’s PRIV and DTEK50. We’ve also spent some time tuning our engines to get more performance from our Android apps as well as swatting some pesky bugs.

Here are the other treatsfeatures you’ll get in October’s Android software updates.

BlackBerry Hub+

Facebook Messenger support: Messenger is now a listed account within Hub+, enabling you to see and open all your Facebook Messenger communications directly within Hub+.

Save inline images: It’s easier to save an image in the body of an email with a simple press and hold on the email.

Admin-defined signatures: Hub+ now supports an IT-pushed signature when activated against Android for Work, increasing IT’s administrative control over signatures.

BlackBerry Android Keyboard

Multiple ways to switch languages: You can set a dedicated language key or use the spacebar to choose a keyboard language, making it quicker and easier to change between languages.

Global gesture support: “Swipe to delete” is now available as a settings option if you’re using Type by Swiping.

More enterprise security: You can separate vocabulary learned in your personal space from words learned in your work space.

BlackBerry Launcher

Dynamic calendar icon: For any Android 5.x or higher user running the BlackBerry Calendar and Launcher apps, the BlackBerry Calendar icon will always show the current date. In fact, any calendar app or icon pack that supports the dynamic icon will work with the BlackBerry Launcher.

BlackBerry Launcher icon: Anyone using the BlackBerry Launcher on a non-BlackBerry phone will see this icon, which helps you switch between launchers or help with updates.

Other updates: Launcher is getting other fixes in notifications, performance, and general aesthetics.

As with previous updates, you should receive a notification when the application updates are available in Google Play and then download them automatically over Wi-Fi. If you need to manually update, you can do the following:

Connect to a Wi-Fi network, then open the Google Play Store

Tap the icon on the left side of the search bar, then select “My apps & games” from the menu that pops up.

Either tap “Update All” or select which apps to update on an individual basis.

Tap “download” and the update will begin, even if you don’t see a progress bar or another indicator.

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/10/octobers-blackberry-android-software-update-more-treats-for-smartphone-users/feed/0Halloween pumpkinsmichaelcl1Children in Halloween costumes reaching into bowl of candyHalloween candy with dog face in background.“Dancing in September” with BlackBerry Android Software Updates for the Best Productivityhttp://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/09/dancing-in-september-with-blackberry-android-software-updates-for-the-best-productivity/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/09/dancing-in-september-with-blackberry-android-software-updates-for-the-best-productivity/#respondThu, 08 Sep 2016 17:25:55 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=35267/ Read More]]>It might be back to school and work for most people, but our summer was busy, as we worked hard to enhance the BlackBerry software experience for users of PRIV, DTEK50, and other Android smartphones. We’ve added many new features to our apps, and improved the app selection for subscribers to our new Hub+ service for non-BlackBerry Android phones.

Of course, for those of you rockin’ BlackBerry smartphones, experiencing our software-in-the-cloud is free and without advertisements – but there’s no reason everyone else shouldn’t learn about what’s new, too!

BlackBerry Hub

Support for Hub+ subscriptions.

Hub Widget: The Hub Widget now lets you select 1 of 3 views: all of the accounts in your Hub, a particular account, or custom view. If you prefer quicker access to your inbox and to sending messages, Hub combined with the BlackBerry Launcher also fully supports Pop-up Widgets.

User Experience Updates: When opening an email or previously snoozed notification from the tray, pressing the back key will now take you into the Hub message list. When in an account view, custom view or folder-specific view, pressing the back key will take you back to the Hub view instead of closing the app.

Conversation View Enhancements: Once an image has been downloaded you can now see a quick thumbnail preview of that attachment. These are presented below the message body, and can be opened by tapping.

Email signatures: GEEK ALERT! Email signatures now support rendering HTML. With a little bit of HTML skill, you can get creative and add advanced formatting, images and hyperlinks to your email signatures. Just enter the HTML content into the signature field in the accounts settings screen. Here are a few examples of what you can do:

Weblinks <a href=”Insert URL here”>Text you want to linkify!</a>

Images <img src=”Insert URL here”> images must be an HTTP(s) link to the image of your choice

Printing: This feature may not be for everyone, but it can still be pretty gosh darn useful. The “3 dots” menu on an email now includes the option to print. This hooks into the Android printing framework, so if you already have set a printer up, then it’s super easy to fire the email off to your printer.

SCEP / Cert-based Authentication: Don’t worry, Admins – we have you covered, too! Administrators can now set up email accounts in the Hub that utilize certificates for authentication instead of passwords. You can make your business deployments even faster, easier and less painful for both users and yourself.

Keyboard

Japanese Input: You can now configure the BlackBerry Keyboard to type in Japanese.

Keyboard Stats: Want to compare your typing skills with your friends and co-workers? Now you can! Under BlackBerry Keyboard settings, you can see how many words you’ve typed, how it’s helped you, and even how often you Emoji.

Customized Symbols: I’m going to keep this simple because next week we’ll do an in-depth blog on this one, but you can now change the symbols screen to meet your needs! Keep an eye out for more details, or go experiment for yourself.

Calendar

Support for Hub+ subscriptions

Quick Reminder: Based on your feedback, we wanted to provide a simple UI to quickly create a reminder with some text, a location, a reminder and a due date. When tapping the Compose icon in the Calendar app, you now have the option of creating a calendar event/meeting OR a quick reminder.

Out of Office Availability: You can now set your status to “Out of Office” and have this sync to Exchange. “Working Elsewhere” is going to be coming in the next release as well.

Contacts

Now available on non-BlackBerry Android Smartphones with support for Hub+ subscriptions.

Copy Contacts Across Accounts: Quickly migrate all of your contact data from one account to another with the click of a button. To prevent duplicate contacts, you also have the option to delete all contacts from the originating account after the transfer. This feature can be found in Contact Settings > General Settings > Copy Contacts.

Notes/Tasks

Now available on non-BlackBerry Android Smartphones with support for Hub+ subscriptions.

As with previous releases, you should be notified when the application updates are available in Google Play, and your device should then download them automatically over Wi-Fi. If it does not:

Connect to a Wi-Fi network, then open the Google Play Store

Tap the icon on the left side of the search bar, then select “My apps & games” from the menu that pops up.

Either tap “Update All” or select which apps to update on an individual basis.

Tap “download” and the update will begin, even if you don’t see a progress bar or another indicator.

Note: apps may not show up in Google Play for up to 24 hours.

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/09/dancing-in-september-with-blackberry-android-software-updates-for-the-best-productivity/feed/0Young woman dancing on riversidemichaelcl1Young woman dancing on riversidesept-android-update-screenshot1keyboard-stats-imagesept-android-update-screenshot-2PRIV and DTEK50 users get more Great Stuff!http://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/08/priv-and-dtek50-users-get-more-great-stuff/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/08/priv-and-dtek50-users-get-more-great-stuff/#respondWed, 03 Aug 2016 15:14:33 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=34602/ Read More]]>For our Android update this month, we are happy to share an abundance of new features debuting in our software applications available to PRIV and DTEK50 smartphones. We continue to hear your feedback and bring in features from BlackBerry 10, like the Pinch Filter in Hub, to ongoing productivity enhancements in every app. Let’s get right in to it and talk about what the new enhancements are!

Hub: Pinch Filter and More

Pinch Filter: With a simple, familiar gesture, Hub will filter to your choice of snoozed items, unread items, emails marked as high importance, flagged emails, or muted conversations. By default, the pinch gesture filters to unread messages, including both email and integrated social / instant messaging content, which can be customized by visiting Display and Actions in BlackBerry Hub and tapping Pinch Filter Criteria.

Quick Send: To keep you as efficient as possible, you can now press both the Ctrl and Enter keys on PRIV’s physical keyboard to send an email message, provided your PRIV screen is displaying the body of the email message.

Viber Integration: Notifications from the Android Viber IM app are now integrated into the BlackBerry Hub.

Twitter refresh: With a refresh button, it is now easier to check for new content. Pressing the refresh button will manually sync and retrieve the newest Twitter posts.

WhatsApp Improvements: Many users described experiencing problems reading messages in the WhatsApp application and then coming to the BlackBerry Hub to find those messages still marked unread. Messages should now all be appropriately marked as read in the Hub.

General Improvements:

Large email conversations now open significantly more quickly due to an improved design which hides read messages by default. Blocks of three or more read messages will be “collapsed” into a segment indicating the number of hidden messages, while the first and last message in the conversation are always shown. Unread messages in a conversation are shown by default.

Improvements have been made to reduce the need for manually dismissing the spark, and to better follow the state of content within the Hub.

Keyboard: Quick Language Switch, New Languages and an Even Better Keyboard

Quicker language switch: Long pressing on the spacebar (or using a shortcut) will allow you to quickly switch between languages.

Chinese language support: Support for Pinyin and Cangjie on the virtual keyboard and PRIV’s physical keyboard.

Smarter Keyboard

Easy Access to Learned Words: Making it easy for you to find and remove words from Settings that shouldn’t have been learned.

Easier Error Corrections: Sometimes you make a mistake and keep typing, but then think “Gosh, I should really correct that.” Well, now when you go back to correct a word it uses the words around the error word instead of just the word before, for greater context and more accurate suggestions for replacing mistyped words.

Improvements for “I” or “a” keypresses: If you accidentally hit a key near those letters we’ll make sure we correct it for the win.

Currency key match: The previous update allowed you to set the currency key for PRIV’s physical keyboard—now, the virtual keyboard matches that.

Camera: Performance and Usability Improvements

Performance Enhancements: To snap the best shot possible we are working on improving the average picture capture time. We’ve seen improvements as much as 0.25 seconds per shot—trust us, it matters!

External Shutter Triggers: You are now able to capture photos using the headphone’s mic button, keyboard hardware keys, or Bluetooth remote triggers.

Video preview image capture: If you can’t decide whether to take a video or photo, you can capture video and take photos at the same time within the video preview mode.

Manual control settings display: With the advanced controls we’ve added, you can adjust white balance, focus, shutter speed, and ISO. Now, we also display real-time value changes as you adjust each setting.

Video resolution and frame rate toggle: We now display your video resolution and frame rate from the video preview screen. This way, you can adjust it more conveniently.

Calendar: Continued Improvements

Free/Busy suggestions for Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync: You can now access a list of suggested times that will work for all or most of the attendees specified in the invitee list. This feature suggests time slots where most attendees are available on the specified day, within the next 5 business days, as well as when attendees are not available, or data on their availability is not accessible.

Tag & Labels: You can now create tags for notes and tasks to sort them on your device, or have tags/labels from Outlook synced to your phone.

As with previous updates, your PRIV (or DTEK50) should notify you when the application updates are available in Google Play and then download them automatically over Wi-Fi. If it does not, you can update them as follows:

Connect to a Wi-Fi network, then open the Google Play Store

Tap the icon on the left side of the search bar, then select “My apps & games” from the menu that pops up.

Either tap “Update All” or select which apps to update on an individual basis.

Tap “download” and the update will begin, even if you don’t see a progress bar or another indicator.

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/08/priv-and-dtek50-users-get-more-great-stuff/feed/0PRIV28-squaremichaelcl1PRIV28-squarelanguage switch priv updateMore Camera and Keyboard Improvements Coming to PRIVhttp://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/05/more-camera-and-keyboard-improvements-coming-to-priv/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/05/more-camera-and-keyboard-improvements-coming-to-priv/#commentsThu, 26 May 2016 18:45:50 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=32858/ Read More]]>Since the launch of PRIV, we’ve been hard at work continuing to improve the experience and making it even better for our customers. Earlier this month, we launched Google’s Android Marshmallow update for PRIV, which has gotten rave reviews from users.

Today, we are updating a few apps in Google Play with new features. And we’ll be introducing a software maintenance release starting on June 6th to align with our regular monthly security release.

But first – let’s talk application updates.

Camera: Advanced Shooting Controls

Users will have the ability to enter a mode with advanced manual controls giving them access to capture settings such as: shutter speed, ISO sensitivity, focus, white balance and exposure (EV) compensation

Physical keyboard shortcuts for camera controls

Swipe horizontally on keyboard to adjust the setting currently active

Swipe vertically on keyboard to change the active setting

Press the A key to return the active setting to Auto

Press and hold the A key to return all settings to Auto

Press the spacebar to take a picture

Additional learning to help users be more creative with every photo

Keyboard: New Languages and Updates

Vietnamese input support for both the virtual and physical keyboards

Korean Hangul support for both the virtual and physical keyboards

User control on currency key allowing even further customization to meet your needs

Continues improvements to predictions and autocorrect

Control keyboard shortcuts (if supported in the application)

CTRL + B: Bold

CTRL + U: Underline

CTRL + I: Italic

Ctrl + Z: Undo

Ctrl + Y: Redo

Ctrl + X: Cut

Ctrl + C: Copy

Ctrl + V: Paste

As with prior updates, your PRIV should notify you that the updates are available and download them automatically over Wi-Fi. If it does not, you can update them as follows:

Connect your PRIV to a Wi-Fi network, then open the Google Play store.

Tap the icon on the left side of the search bar, then select “My apps & games” from the menu that pops up.

Either tap “Update All” or select which apps to update on an individual basis.

Tap “Download” and the update will begin, even if you don’t see a progress bar or other indicator.

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/05/more-camera-and-keyboard-improvements-coming-to-priv/feed/1PRIV-camera-squaremichaelcl1Man_mode_cameraNew and Improved Camera, Launcher, and Keyboard for PRIV Now Available on Google Playhttp://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/02/new-and-improved-camera-launcher-and-keyboard-for-priv-now-available-on-google-play/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/02/new-and-improved-camera-launcher-and-keyboard-for-priv-now-available-on-google-play/#respondTue, 01 Mar 2016 03:44:49 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=31045/ Read More]]>At BlackBerry, we’re constantly listening to your feedback and working hard to find ways we might improve the PRIV, our first secure Android smartphone. With that in mind, we’re happy to announce that starting today (Feb. 29), several application updates are now live on Google Play, including the BlackBerry Launcher, BlackBerry Keyboard, and BlackBerry Camera. These updates are in addition to our latest security patch, released earlier this month.

Improvements include:

Camera: Support for slow motion video

Users can capture smooth slow motion video with PRIV’s camera that’s up to four times slower. The Slow Motion function can be accessed through the camera’s “Mode” button, and captures video at 120 fps which plays back smoothly at 30 fps. Audio is not enabled for slow-motion video at this time.

General stability and performance improvements.

Keyboard: Better predictive typing, accuracy, and control

PRIV’s prediction engine now processes a user’s email and social messages to better understand the user’s typing style and provide a better out-of-box experience.

Predictive typing can now learn words with numbers.

Option to have the keyboard suggest names from a user’s contacts during email creation.

Fine Cursor Control mode on the physical keyboard now features an enhanced cursor locator along with on-screen arrows for easier positioning and control.

Holding down ‘delete’ for two seconds now deletes on a word-by-word basis, making it easier to stop on single words.

Tapping a key on the physical keyboard more accurately places the focus cursor on screen.

Tap the icon on the left side of the search bar, then select “My apps & games” from the menu that pops up.

Either tap “Update All” or select which apps to update on an individual basis.

Tap “download” and the update will begin, even if you don’t see a progress bar or other indicator.

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/02/new-and-improved-camera-launcher-and-keyboard-for-priv-now-available-on-google-play/feed/0PRIV Camera Black & Whitemichaelcl1PRIV by BlackBerry, camera, Schneider-KreuznachScreenshot_20160221-224937Screenshot_20160220-153601As Latest PRIV Security Update Releases, A Few Wordshttp://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/02/as-latest-priv-security-update-releases-a-few-words/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/02/as-latest-priv-security-update-releases-a-few-words/#respondMon, 01 Feb 2016 16:24:25 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=30551/ Read More]]>When BlackBerry first designed the PRIV, we did so with privacy and security in mind. In addition to applying our own security expertise to the Android OS, we’ve committed ourselves to the release of monthly security patches, in order to better protect our users against emerging threats in the Android space. Since launch, we’ve kept that promise, with the release of our latest update today.

We’ve not done so alone. The majority of our carrier partners have pledged support to our efforts, and some have even taken measures to facilitate quicker certification of our patches. As a result, we’ve managed to deliver our security updates the same day as Google’s Nexus devices receive theirs – and in some cases, even before.

One thing we’ve learned from our monthly release is how important security really is to our end users. We’ve seen fantastic uptake rates on our PRIV patches thus far, with more than 70% of users in some regions installing January’s update within the first 24 hours.

Android security has proven itself a consistent challenge for both carriers and OEMs, requiring an ongoing commitment to patching and prevention. With the PRIV, we set out to make such a commitment, tapping into the same expertise that’s earned us a reputation as a market leader in security. And it’s that same reputation which has inspired so many to throw their support behind the PRIV:

“I asked my Enterprise reviewer if he would buy the device, and he said…’I am happy that my company is not worried about my using it for work because they trust Blackberry. This phone also has the space to store all the downloaded BBC iPlayer content, as well as the app itself, to watch during long-haul flights to the US makes it worthy of the £570 that Blackberry are asking for it!’”

“The Android OS gets knocked for not being secure and security is the special sauce that BlackBerry brings to the table. The niche they are going after is the enterprise user who wants a hard keyboard and wants to do more than only business on their phone.”

“[The PRIV] will be the first mainstream Android smartphone vendor to offer not only monthly security updates, before even Google pushes them, but also hotfix patching and enterprise-managed updates via the BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) and OTA management systems. Add in the hardened kernel and a “hardware root of trust” with the silicon providers and manufacturing process, and you get a smartphone that goes the extra mile to make your content secure.”

We designed the PRIV for privacy and security, and we remain committed to that design. Moving forward, we’ll continue dedicating ourselves to making Android as secure as possible. You – and your personal information – deserve no less.

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2016/02/as-latest-priv-security-update-releases-a-few-words/feed/0PRIV With Keyboardmichaelcl1PRIVUpdated DTEK, Keyboard, Hub, and Camera Apps for PRIV Are Now Live On Google Playhttp://blogs.blackberry.com/2015/12/updated-dtek-keyboard-hub-and-camera-apps-for-priv-are-now-live-on-google-play/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2015/12/updated-dtek-keyboard-hub-and-camera-apps-for-priv-are-now-live-on-google-play/#respondMon, 14 Dec 2015 17:48:06 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=29545/ Read More]]>The Android experience on BlackBerry just got a whole lot better. Starting today (Dec. 14), application updates are becoming available for PRIV, including the DTEK privacy app along with BlackBerry Keyboard, Hub, Contacts and Camera. We’ve been listening to your feedback and are working to add new features and even fix your issues.

Improvements in Fine Cursor Control, including the use of the Touch Keyboard

Option to use Shift key to toggle number row to show symbols in password fields

DTEK by BlackBerry: More notification options to alert you when apps use your info

Turn on all notifications for all applications at once

The ability to turn on notifications by information type, including location, microphone, camera, and other personal information

Hub & Contacts: Now includes WhatsApp

WhatsApp notification integration – allows the user to view notifications of new chat content from WhatsApp directly in the Hub, and better manage their communications through features like Snooze and unread filters.

Keyboard shortcuts for ‘next’ and ‘previous’ message transition

The ability to change the order in which conversations are sorted

Location lookup for contact information lets you type in a point of interest and use it to populate a contact card

We’ll keep you posted as we continue to include more of your favorite messaging and social media notifications directly into BlackBerry Hub over the next few months.

Your device should notify you that these updates are available and even download them automatically over wifi. If for some reason it does not (for example, if you’ve turned off automatic updates), then you can update your apps as follows:

Great keyboards are in our DNA. With BlackBerry Passport, we set out to create a smartphone that would break some cherished rules in order to set a new bar for real productivity. In particular, BlackBerry Passport’s keyboard will show there is an easier way to do more.

The Keys to Successful Productivity

BlackBerry Passport is a unique device that was built with productivity at its core. The revolutionary new physical keyboard is responsive to touch, so you have more ways to control your smartphone without having to use the touchscreen. With rows of touch-sensitive physical keys, BlackBerry Passport combines the efficiency of tactile typing with touchscreen-like navigation to deliver on that productivity promise.

This way, you’ll be able to keep your eyes on the goal – getting things done. (If you’re a developer, head over to the Developer blog to learn how you can take advantage of the new BlackBerry Passport keyboard in your apps.)

With the BlackBerry Passport’s touch-enabled keyboard, you’ll be able to navigate web pages, apps and e-mails by lightly brushing your fingers over the keys, which helps with things like scrolling and cursor placement. It’s a minimalist design that maximizes BlackBerry Passport’s already-awesome amount of screen real estate. You’ll be able to read documents faster, as well as keep your fingers close to the keys, ready to type.

But what does this Mean?!

The BlackBerry Passport’s keyboard also sports some custom commands that can boost your productivity.
Let’s take a look:

Faster scrolling: As noted above, you can use the keyboard to swipe up and down to scroll on long lists in a document or on a browser page, keeping your fingers off the screen and focused on what’s happening.

More intuitive cursor control and text selection: This is a classic BlackBerry productivity enhancement reinvented for the BlackBerry Passport. Double-tap the keyboard, then drag your finger across the keyboard to drop the cursor at precisely the right point. Or select the text just as you would on an older BlackBerry: hold the SHIFT key while dragging your finger across the keyboard to extend a selection.

Smart, contextual virtual keys: The BlackBerry Passport’s QWERTY 3-row keyboard creates a clean-looking, right-sized layout. There is also a virtual 4th row on-screen that smartly shifts depending on context. So if you’re typing a password on-screen, the 4th row would automatically include numbers and symbols commonly used in passwords. If you’re typing an e-mail, the ‘@’ symbol will be displayed, and when surfing the Web, the colon and backslash characters needed to type in a URL will be displayed. Like I said, smart! With a little practice, most BlackBerry Passport users should find themselves typing faster than ever before.

Flick to type: Stuck on a word? BlackBerry 10’s next word suggestion feature learns from you to give you smart, personalized choice of words you’re likely to type. You then just flick up to complete the word.

Easier delete: Made a mistake? No problem, just swipe back (left) to Delete the last word, just like on our virtual keyboard!

Entering an accented character? Hold the letter key down, and then lightly tap on the key to add the appropriate accent!

As you can see, we’ve taken something great – the BlackBerry 10 keyboard – and innovated with the boundary-breaking design of the BlackBerry Passport form factor, while staying focused on one thing: YOUR productivity.

Stay tuned as we look forward to continuing to bring you more details in the near future!

Last week was an exciting week for those following me on my BBM Channel [MichaelClewley C00014277]. I offered an advanced preview of the nearly 20 small but useful features we have planned for BlackBerry 10.3 OS. Here’s a look back at what was covered, and also answers to some of the common questions posted in the BBM Channel comments. You may have noticed the posts were broken down into some themes: New UI, Home Screen, Hub, Calendar & Remember and a catch-all Miscellaneous bucket. I’ve broken this blog post into the same themes.

New UI

‘Signature Action’: The action bar at the bottom of the screen has been updated for a simpler, cleaner experience. The most commonly used action is in the center of the bar and highlighted with blue color to give it focus. The secondary actions flank the primary or ‘signature action’ for functionality. The main action is static for each app/screen. For all you developers out there keep an eye out for how to take advantage of this feature in your app!

Updated Icons: While the SDK doesn’t include all the updated icons for the new 10.3 look, all apps will receive a fresh new treatment. We listened to your feedback to remove the box around the icons in BlackBerry 10. I’m happy to let you know we are doing this to give icons a clean, new look.

Home Screen

Endless Folders: That’s right, now you can jam more apps into a single folder, as you can have pages and pages of applications. For those of you who have multiple folders that you want to combine into one . . . we’ve thought of that! Just drag and drop a folder onto another and it will merge the apps into a single folder. Sorry, no folders within folders for this release.

Empty Home Screen: One of the changes made to the home screen is making the “running apps grid” always there even if you close your last application. Less confusion, more predictability for end users. Also, it’s a great way to show off your wallpaper!

Fast Quick Settings Access: Changing system settings from anywhere is only a two-finger-swipe away. From within any application a two-finger-swipe from the top will pull down the systems quick settings menu. Why two fingers rather than one? Well, simple, one-finger-swipe is already in use. To make that work would require all third-party applications being re-written. Don’t worry, you can still use one-finger-swipe from the home screen itself.

Blog Bonus — More Apps on Screen: You noticed that the screenshots provided had some more icons than you are used to. The BlackBerry Z3, Z10 & Z30 now get an extra row of apps. For my QWERTY friends rocking out on a Q5 or Q10, you get an extra column of apps.

BlackBerry Hub

Download All Attachments: We’ve added a button to the email screen that allows you to quickly download all email attachments. This is handy when you’re heading offline onto, say, an airplane and want to have all your attachments on your device.

Delete Original Text: When replying to an email, you can now delete all of the original text.

Remote IMAP Search: Even if e-mail items are no longer on your BlackBerry they are still always available for you to find and view! Just customize your account sync window.

File Sent Messages: Allows you to file sent messages into specific folders defined in the mail box.

BlackBerry Hub “Reset”: The BlackBerry Hub will now close / auto-save open content and default to the list after 30 minutes of inactivity.

Calendar & Remember

Weekly Agenda: We’ve had many comments about wanting an “endless” agenda view. We’ve taken a step in that direction today and have added a weekly agenda view. The weeks are outlined at the top and you have a total agenda view for that week below. As this is still in beta you’ll notice the color is slightly different, so don’t mind that for now.

Tasks in Calendar: Pretty simple addition that lets you create a task from within the calendar app itself, and of course see those tasks listed in the calendar. Tasks created in Remember will show in the calendar. Calendar-created tasks are also listed in Remember.

Notifications Meeting Mode: Ever been in a meeting and had your phone go off when it shouldn’t have? Well here’s a neat feature that should allow you to save face. The notification profile will be tweaked automatically based on your calendar. This, of course, is an opt-in feature, so don’t worry that you’ll start missing desired notifications.

Remember Updates: Are you a Tasks person or a Notes person? Well, we’ve made Remember easier to use for those who really like to organize. The tasks and notes are separated by a tab and as a user you’ll have the ability to set what your default view is.

Miscellaneous

Camera: An updated UI makes it simpler to take a picture, switch between cameras and toggle certain features.

Filer Picker Album View: When sending a picture from the file manager in BlackBerry 10.3, there’s now an album view, just like within the Pictures app.

Settings List Re-arrange: In BlackBerry 10.3 you’ll be able to re-arrange the order of the Settings menu, allowing you to move your most frequently-used items to the top.

This is a developer beta – there may still be some changes. Also, I’ve only talked about what is in plain sight and found in the BlackBerry 10.3 beta SDK. There’s much much more to come! We encourage developers to download the tools and the SDK and to provide feedback. A quick word of warning for the average user: this OS update is not yet ready for you. It is a stripped-down version of BlackBerry 10, with many features removed. So if you expect this to be fully functional you’ll have a sad face. For screenshots and additional details be sure to follow my BBM Channel [MichaelClewley C00014277].

Onstage at the BlackBerry Live conference in Orlando, Thorsten Heins, President and CEO, BlackBerry just announced that all of you BlackBerry Z10 customers are in for a treat. An update to BlackBerry 10 software has been released with new features designed to keep you moving. BlackBerry 10.1 is a free update that will be rolling out with carrier partners over the coming weeks.

I’ve chatted with the product development team about what you can expect in the update and there are definitely some exciting changes and features to highlight, and best of all updating is free and easy to do over a WiFi® network.

New BlackBerry 10.1 Features:

BlackBerry Hub: The BlackBerry Hub lets you access all your messages and notifications in one place. With BlackBerry 10.1 support for PIN to PIN messages for direct communication between BlackBerry smartphones has been added to the BlackBerry Hub. Plus, improved attachment support in the BlackBerry Hub makes it easier to view emails which have been sent as attachments to other messages.

Notifications: With BlackBerry 10.1 you can personalize the notifications for your accounts and contacts so you always know what is happening around you. Customize ringtones, vibration and the LED light by contact or by account for more personalized notifications.

Fine Cursor Control: BlackBerry 10.1 makes it easier and more accurate to pinpoint exactly where you want to type. Tap once to bring up the cursor. Grab the blue circle and drag it around to place it exactly where you need it. Tap either side of the circle to move left or right by just one character. It’s easy to move around with speed and precision.

Camera: BlackBerry 10 lets you create the perfect shot by moving parts of your picture backwards and forwards in time with Time Shift mode. BlackBerry 10.1 adds an HDR shooting mode for beautiful images in tricky lighting conditions. A standard image takes a picture at one exposure level. Where you have high contrast between light and dark areas of the photo, fine details can be lost. High Dynamic Range (HDR) mode takes multiple pictures at different exposure levels and layers them automatically to produce a single photo that combines the best of the dark and light areas.

Lots more to discover: You’ll find lots of new improvements across the BlackBerry 10 OS like landscape support for the calendar, easier international dialing, improved red eye reduction in the picture editor and much more. The first step to discovering these new features is to update your BlackBerry 10 software.

How to update to BlackBerry 10.1:

Updating to BlackBerry 10.1 is free and easy to do. To update your BlackBerry Z10 smartphone to BlackBerry 10.1 look for the alert in the notifications section of the BlackBerry Hub. You can also check for software updates through the settings menu by visiting the software updates section. The download will happen in the background and the update will be applied without needing to back up your smartphone. All of your information remains safe. As always, we recommend you have a current backup of your BlackBerry Z10 smartphone readily available. For more information on how to update your BlackBerry Z10 smartphone, visit www.BlackBerry.com/update

There you have it – BlackBerry 10.1 will soon be available for your BlackBerry Z10 device. Please let us know what you think of these features and refinements in the comments below.

Today we issued a software update for BlackBerry 10 smartphones that’s focused on your feedback. It’s already available from some carriers and we’re working closely with all our carrier partners to get it to you as soon as possible.

It’s almost been a month since we officially unveiled the new BlackBerry 10 smartphones and many of you already have a BlackBerry Z10 in hand. You’ve been using it for weeks, and we’ve been listening to your feedback, and have been working on an update just for you. Here are just a few of the improvements you can expect after updating your software.

3rd Party App Performance

We’ve improved performance for 3rd party applications, so developers can build apps that run fast and smooth for you. With this update, you might want to keep an eye out for some fresh new app launches in March, like WhatsApp.

Among the top improvements and features are fixes for Gmail calendars on BlackBerry 10. You’ll also find improvements in the BlackBerry Hub for logging calls log and how conversations are handled. We’ve also made general improvements to importing contacts from online sources.

Camera

We’ve optimized the camera for better photos in low-light situations. You’ll love the difference this makes for photos where you don’t use a flash – like the Time Shift Camera feature.

Browser and Media

With more and more of you using the gorgeous screen on the BlackBerry Z10 to consume online videos and media, we’ve made a number of improvements to the software in the way the browser handles video playback to provide a fantastic experience.

Battery Life

The software team has included a number of battery life optimizations with over 60 battery saving improvements since launch to keep you moving. These combined improvements are designed so that you see improvements in battery life and heavy users especially should see a longer average usage per charge cycle.

How to update your software on BlackBerry 10

Software is available over the air (OTA). Typically, you’ll get a notification about new updates, but you can manually check to see if it has been made available by your service provider and install it in a few simple steps.Settings> Software Updates> Check for Updates> — then follow the on screen steps to install.

The download is approximately 150MB in size, so I recommend updating when connected to Wi-Fi.

There you have it – the first OTA update to your BlackBerry 10 smartphone. We’ll be rolling out the update with all of our carrier partners around the globe over the coming weeks. Be sure to check it out when it’s available and let us know what you think in the comments below. Your feedback is always welcomed and we will continue to listen as we update and improve BlackBerry 10.

Great news for all you BlackBerry ® PlayBook ™ tablet fans out there. We have updated the operating system software to version 2.1 and packed some new features and functionality in to the already powerful OS. If you enjoy the multitasking, social integration and strong communications functionality in the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet, you’ll love what’s new. Here are my three favorite changes:

Updated BlackBerry Bridge: Now you can view, respond and compose new SMS messages on their BlackBerry PlayBook Tablet when connected to a BlackBerry smartphone over Bluetooth®. You’ll also enjoy increased performance and speed of other BlackBerry Bridge functions as well. So you can do more, more efficiently. Txt away, my friends.

Email and PIM Enhancements: You’ve asked for it and we’ve delivered portrait support for email, calendar and contacts, giving you the option to use your tablet in either orientation to message. This will definitely come in handy for those of you who enjoy thumb typing in portrait mode like I do.

Improved Android Application Support: Includes Multi-Window Applications, Camera Support and In-App Payments. We all love a richer app experience, and with the improvements to the Android runtime, that’s just what you’ll get. Running the applications in separate windows allows you to multi-task between Android apps easier, and in-app payments will make it easier for you to enhance your app content. Game on!

There are also a ton new features on the enterprise side so you can separate your work from personal data, check out Luke’s post on the Inside BlackBerry for Business blog for more details. We’ve added more apps and content as well including an update to the Print to Go app and the Canadian video store now comes preloaded into the OS so there’s no need for you to download it from the BlackBerry® App World™ storefront.

The update is available starting today for the WiFi® versions of the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet and availability for the 4G LTE™ BlackBerry PlayBook is expected within the next month, upon carrier approval of software.

How to update your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet:

You will automatically receive a software update notification on the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet status ribbon, or you can check for the software update at any time by going to the settings menu under “Software Updates” and tapping “Check for Updates”. Then follow the steps to update.

Learning more and obtaining support:

For those that have some additional questions or need additional support, visit the BlackBerry PlayBook support website. To find the support website for your specific location, visit the following link and select Get Support next to your preferred language & location.

Have a BlackBerry PlayBook? Check out the update and let us know what you think in the comments.

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2012/10/playbook-os-2-1-update/feed/0michaelcl1BlackBerry PlayBook TabletBlackBerry PlayBook OS 2.0.1 Update Now Availablehttp://blogs.blackberry.com/2012/04/playbook-os-2-0-1-update/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2012/04/playbook-os-2-0-1-update/#respondTue, 17 Apr 2012 13:00:04 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=13224]]>A new version of the BlackBerry® PlayBook™ OS – v2.0.1.358 – is now available to all users. This free update can be downloaded over-the-air from your BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet.

How to update your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet

Users will automatically receive a software update notification on the BlackBerry® PlayBook tablet status ribbon, or they can check for the software update at any time by going to the settings menu under “Software Updates” and tapping “Check for Updates”. Users who purchase and activate a BlackBerry PlayBook tablet on or after April, 17 2012 will automatically be updated to v2.0.1 as part of the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet setup process.

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2012/04/playbook-os-2-0-1-update/feed/0michaelcl1How BlackBerry PlayBook OS 2.0 revolutionizes Email, Calendar and Contacts – again: Part 2 of 2http://blogs.blackberry.com/2012/02/playbook-email-calendar-contacts-part-2/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2012/02/playbook-email-calendar-contacts-part-2/#respondTue, 21 Feb 2012 19:30:30 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=12790]]>The name BlackBerry® is synonymous with mobile email, and thanks to the expertise of RIM® family members – Tungle for Calendar and Gist for Contacts – we’ve extended our messaging DNA in some really compelling ways with the introduction of BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet OS 2.0. Because the new Email, Calendar, and Contacts applications all include people-centric information, we’ve integrated social functionality into all three . For example, you don’t have to leave the calendar to get information about the attendees for that meeting. Let’s dive in and take a look at these new features.

Calendar with social integration

Like the new Messages app that includes a universal Inbox, so you can conveniently manage all your email in one place, the new Calendar app in PlayBook OS 2.0 allows you to manage all your appointments and events in one place – including the ability to manage both work and personal (Gmail®, Hotmail®, Yahoo!®) appointments and Facebook® events (never miss a birthday again!). Of course, the Calendar app offers the common features that you’ve come to know and love, but it now also includes some compelling new features to help you organize your day:

People View: In addition to the traditional Day, Agenda, Week, Month views, you can now view your day based on the people you’re meeting with. This view provides additional information on your contacts pulled from LinkedIn®, including where you’ve met in the past.

Visual Cues: You’ll be able to more quickly scan and manage your calendar at a glance. For example, the Calendar app provides visual cues that identify days that have more appointments than those that are relatively light. For example, when you view your calendar at a glance, dates with many appointments will show up in a larger font while the dates in smaller fonts have fewer appointments. If you have a lot of appointment conflicts, a red highlight identifies the conflict so you can’t miss them!

Zoom in to a detailed view: From the “Week” view, you can go directly to a day’s calendar with ease. Simply tap any day to zoom into the details of that day, including the meetings you have scheduled and the people you will be meeting with.

Contacts: Your social hub

Your contacts are more than just an address and phone number, so why treat it like a rolodex? The new Contacts app acts as a social hub that helps you maintain a complete and current view of your contact’s social status.

Contact Linking: The majority of people use more than email and phone to stay in touch with their personal and professional contacts — Facebook, Twitter®, and LinkedIn are growing exponentially in their popularity and usability. The Contacts app allows you to automatically bring all these distinct social profiles into a single people-centric view in your address book – meaning you can set up one contact name and integrate all of their contact and social profile information into one profile. You also have the option to reduce duplicate entries, and manually link or de-couple your contacts from social profiles. Watch this demo to learn more.

Status Updates and People Views: Using information gathered from Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, the Contacts app lets you see your contact’s recent social status updates and common friends.

Meetings, Places, and News: Be prepared before walking into that meeting. For each of your contacts, you can view past (and future) meetings with that person, see the places you’ve met previously, and read news about their company.

Favorites and Video Chat: Mark your top contacts as a “favorite” for quicker access, and sort your address book by those contacts who also use BlackBerry PlayBook Video Chat.

We built the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet OS 2.0 email, calendar and contacts experience with the goal of providing the best tools for managing your busy life across all of your networks. I’m so proud of the team for pulling it off, and we’re just getting started! We have a ton of ideas, and look forward to getting your feedback.

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2012/02/playbook-email-calendar-contacts-part-2/feed/0michaelcl1contacts-democalendar-democontacts-demo-tcalendar-demo-tHow BlackBerry PlayBook OS 2.0 revolutionizes Email, Calendar and Contacts – again: Part 1 of 2http://blogs.blackberry.com/2012/02/playbook-email-calendar-contacts-part-1/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2012/02/playbook-email-calendar-contacts-part-1/#respondTue, 21 Feb 2012 19:14:56 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=12775]]>In January at CES 2012 and at BlackBerry® DevCon Europe, you had some great opportunities to get sneak peeks at what the BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet OS 2.0 has to offer. We heard loud and clear that you wanted native email, calendar and contacts, and we’ve delivered something that we’re all very proud of. With BlackBerry PlayBook tablet OS 2.0, features like your email, calendar and contacts have unique social integration that is people-centric rather than app-centric.
The approach to these experiences is simple: If you think about how you interact with email, calendar, and contacts on a daily basis, you’re basically in two modes: triage (taking stock of what’s happening in your world) and acting.

Email and the Universal Inbox

The new Messages apps gives a nod to the past by continuing to build on proven experiences. The iconic BlackBerry splat noting the arrival of new messages in the universal inbox remains part of the core messaging experience. But the BlackBerry PlayBook OS 2.0 messaging experience goes a step further; it has been extended to include ‘social messaging’, allowing you to directly integrate messages from some of the most common social networks: Facebook®, LinkedIn®, and Twitter®.

And to take it one step beyond just integrated social messaging, you can now see a contact’s social details right from the Messages application.

Once you have an inbox full of messages, the new Messages app delivers a suite of features that help make managing your inbox really easy:

Tabbed email: You can reference one email while you compose another, or put an email you’re in the middle of composing on hold, while you type out a quick response to another message.

Rich text editing: You can write and edit email like you would on a computer – including support for fonts, attributes and sizes, as well as formatting. You can even edit or insert your “in-line” comments in an email thread.

Message Threading and Quick response: Let’s face it – in an era of ubiquitous mobile devices, email is more chat-like than formal. You can choose to view your messages as threaded conversations rather than single messages. Thread messages reduce a conversation to one inbox entry, thus reducing the signal-to-noise ratio in your inbox.

BlackBerry Keyboard: Longtime users know the keyboard input on BlackBerry smartphones is clever, including auto-entry of periods at the end of sentences and “@” symbols for email addresses. The new PlayBook OS 2.0 keyboard also introduces next word prediction, which helps makes hammering out emails on a virtual keyboard so much easier.

Search: Sometimes you’re not exactly sure what you’re looking for. The search feature allows you to type out a partial string and constrain the search to specific recipient fields or subject, sent, received, and filter by when it was received (today, yesterday, even last week) – all in real time.

As you can see, there are some very cool things in the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet messaging experience. Hold tight for my next post on the Calendar and Contacts experience!

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2012/02/playbook-email-calendar-contacts-part-1/feed/0michaelcl1bbm-splatmessages-demomessages-demo-tBlackBerry PlayBook OS Updatehttp://blogs.blackberry.com/2011/12/blackberry-playbook-os-update-1-0-8/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2011/12/blackberry-playbook-os-update-1-0-8/#respondTue, 06 Dec 2011 21:31:20 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=12028]]>A new version of the BlackBerry® PlayBook OS is now available to all BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet users – BlackBerry PlayBook OS v1.0.8.6067. This free update can be downloaded over-the-air from your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet.

The BlackBerry PlayBook OS v1.0.8.6067 contains the following fixes and updates:

Daylight savings time updates

Security updates as outlined in the BlackBerry Security Advisory KB29191

How to update your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet

Existing BlackBerry PlayBook tablet users will automatically receive a software update notification on the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet status ribbon, or they can check for the software update at any time in the settings menu under “Software Updates”. Users who purchase and activate a BlackBerry PlayBook tablet on or after December 5, 2011 will automatically be updated to v1.0.8.6067 or later as part of the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet setup process.

For users who are already running BlackBerry PlayBook v1.0.8.4985 or higher, the update to this new version (v1.0.8.6067) will include only the updates outlined above and is expected to take only a few minutes to install.

]]>http://blogs.blackberry.com/2011/12/blackberry-playbook-os-update-1-0-8/feed/0michaelcl1BlackBerry PlayBook OS Update: Adobe Flash Player, Adobe AIR and DSThttp://blogs.blackberry.com/2011/11/blackberry-playbook-os-update/
http://blogs.blackberry.com/2011/11/blackberry-playbook-os-update/#respondThu, 24 Nov 2011 15:37:53 +0000http://blogs.blackberry.com/?p=11877]]>A new version of the BlackBerry® PlayBook OS is now available to all BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet users – BlackBerry PlayBook OS v1.0.8.4985. This free update can be downloaded over-the-air from your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet.

The BlackBerry PlayBook OS v1.0.8.4985 contains the following fixes and updates:

Updated version of Adobe® Flash® Player version 11.1 and Adobe AIR® 3.1

Daylight savings time updates for time zones in the regions of Latin America, Australia and Central America

Updated Bluetooth® and Wi-Fi® software to help to improve connectivity

Fixed issues some users were experiencing with account payments in the BlackBerry App World™ storefront

This update also includes a security update for Adobe Flash Player, as noted in Adobe Security Bulletin APSB-11-28, which addresses issues that can potentially affect any PC, tablet, or other device with an operating system that supports Adobe Flash. While there are no known reports of any BlackBerry PlayBook tablet users being affected by these Adobe Flash Player issues, we (as always) encourage all BlackBerry PlayBook tablet users to update to the newest version of the BlackBerry PlayBook OS.

How to update your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet

Existing BlackBerry PlayBook tablet users will automatically receive a software update notification on the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet status ribbon, or they can check for the software update at any time in the settings menu under “Software Updates”. Users who purchase and activate a BlackBerry PlayBook tablet on or after Thursday November 24th, 2011 will automatically be updated to v1.0.8.4985 or later as part of the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet setup process.

For users who are already running BlackBerry PlayBook v1.0.7.2942 or higher, the update to this new version (v1.0.8.4985) will include only the Adobe Flash Player update and is expected to take only a few minutes to install.

On September 21st, Adobe issued an update for Adobe Flash Player, as noted in Adobe Security Bulletins APSB-11-26, which addresses issues that can potentially affect any PC, tablet, or other device with an operating system that supports Adobe Flash.

While there are no known reports of any BlackBerry PlayBook tablet users being affected by these Adobe Flash issues, we (as always) encourage all BlackBerry PlayBook users to update to the newest version of the BlackBerry Tablet OS. For more information about what these security updates mean to the BlackBerry PlayBook, please see our security advisory.

How to update your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet

Existing BlackBerry PlayBook tablet users will automatically receive a software update notification on the BlackBerry PlayBook status ribbon, or they can check for the software update at any time in the settings menu under Software Updates. Users who purchase and activate a BlackBerry PlayBook tablet on or after Thursday October 6th will automatically be updated to 1.07.3312 or later as part of the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet setup process.

For users who are already running BlackBerry PlayBook v1.0.7.2942 or higher, the update to this new version (v1.07.3312) will include only the Adobe Flash update and is expected to take only a few minutes to install.

Hi all, Michael here once again to tell you about the latest update available for your BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet. BlackBerry® Tablet OS v1.0.7.2942 is available today and it introduces one small but very important new feature: differential updates. The differential updates feature allows us to update only the sections of the BlackBerry Tablet OS that require updating. This should result in smaller download file sizes and therefore faster updating for you! Of course, the differential updates feature will also come in handy as we prepare for more feature-packed BlackBerry Tablet OS updates later this year. =D

In addition to adding new features to the BlackBerry Tablet OS, the BlackBerry PlayBook team at Research In Motion® (RIM®) is always looking for ways to improve your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet experience. As such, we’re thrilled to tell you that we’ve also improved the performance of two key features in BlackBerry Tablet OS v1.0.7.2942.

BlackBerry Tablet OS v1.0.7.2942 can be downloaded over-the-air from your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet. Users who purchase and activate a BlackBerry PlayBook tablet on or after Wednesday, August 24th, 2011 will be automatically updated to v1.0.7.2942 as part of the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet setup process. Existing BlackBerry PlayBook tablet users will be presented with a software update notification on the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet status ribbon, or they can check for the software update at any time in the Settings Menu under Software Updates.

There will also be an update to the BlackBerry Bridge application at this time, so make sure to install it on your BlackBerry smartphone for maximum compatibility!